The Reasons Behind
by PKNight
Summary: Liz comes back to Star's Hollow. She and Jess talk. A few bits of language, so PG. Stand-alone piece.


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A/N: This is a stand-alone fic, but if you want to place it on a timeline, it takes place right before the end this season. Teach Me Tonight and following eps never happened…not that I don't love them, I just want this to fit with my other serious at least remotely.

I don't entirely agree with or like the way everyone portrays Liz in fics. She's either a slut who cares nothing at all about her son, or a drug-addict who is oblivious to everything. And, honestly, I can't see Luke having a "Junkie Ho"-type sister and not trying to do anything about it, much less leaving her to raise a kid in New York. He's the protector-type. But that is just my take, and I'm not criticizing the others who've put Liz in their stories.

I don't own the characters, I don't own the show, I don't own the actors (more's the pity). All I own is the story line. Reviews are always welcome.

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The Reasons Behind

"I'm coming to visit."

"What?" 

"I'll be arriving tomorrow at three. That's when the next bus is set to go through there."

"But—"

"I just want to see the kid, see how he's doing."

"Are you sure you want to do that? How will he react?"

"Depends on if you tell him or not."

"Shouldn't the news come from you?"

"You know I've never been good at confrontations."

"Yeah, I do. But—"

"See you tomorrow, bro."

Luke bid her goodbye and hung up the phone. He looked at the ceiling, pretending he could see through the floor into the apartment, and see Jess there, probably vandalizing some book. Liz was coming tomorrow. Sighing, Luke raked his fingers through his hair, pulling for a moment until the skin around his eyes stretched.

"You're not going for some totally politically incorrect joke there, are you?" Lorelai asked. She stood in front of him with a mug of tea in her hands, and gave it to him.

"What?" 

"Nothing."

"You went behind the counter." Luke did the same, but barred Lorelai from following him, pointing grumpily at a seat at the bar.

"Yeah. But I didn't get coffee. Or, not a lot anyway. I heard you talking to your sister and figured you could use a sedative after." Lorelai smiled. "What'd she have to say this time? Jess doesn't have a sibling, does he?"

"No. You know, sometimes I wish Liz could have been like you. I mean, you raised Rory alone and look how she turned out!" He gestured in frustration to Rory and Dean sitting on a bench on the opposite side of the road.

"Yeah. Thanks. Continue."

"Liz was basically alone raising Jess. You _were_ alone raising Rory. Why didn't it work out the same?"

"Atmosphere would be my best guess," Lorelai said. "It's kind of hard for Rory to be a delinquent in Star's Hollow. Much easier to get into trouble in New York."

"Yeah, maybe. I don't know. My sister wasn't really the motherly type. I don't think she ever planned on having kids. Then she gets married and pregnant all within the same month. He takes off when Jess is—what, six, seven? —and she's left to raise him. She gets dead-end jobs just to pay for necessities, and he's left without any parents at all."

Lorelai sighed. "But when he started to get into serious trouble, she sent him here. I think that showed some thought on her part."

Luke echoed her sigh. "Yeah, maybe. I don't think she ever explained it to Jess. Or anyone, for that matter. Liz doesn't like arguments or explanations."

"Neither do you, apparently, because you still haven't answered my question."

"Sorry. Liz is coming tomorrow. She wants to see how Jess is getting along here. She hated it here, left as soon as she could. Hurt my dad like nothing else. The only time she's been back was for the funeral."

"Wow," Lorelai said, and took a drink of her coffee. "That is pretty big."

"Yeah, and I don't know whether to tell Jess or not," Luke said. "I mean, what if he gets his hopes up about going back to New York? What if he doesn't want to see her at all?" Luke braced his hands on the countertop and hung his head. Lorelai wanted to hug him because he looked so lost.

"What if he sees her on the street?" she asked quietly. "What if she tells him you knew she was coming and didn't tell him? Do you want to lose what little trust you have between you two?"

Luke looked up at her, and managed a small smile. "Well, when you put it that way…. When did you get to be some sort of Oracle?"

"Since I'm outside of the situation and can observe it objectively. You want me to watch the diner while you go talk to Jess?"

"Thanks, but Caesar can handle it." Luke gestured to the older man and went upstairs. He opened the door and was met with a blast of hard rock music. He cringed, but forged ahead into the room. 

The click of the stereo turning off was audible, and Luke shook his head to rid himself of the residual ringing. "Hey," Jess protested. "I was listening to that."

"So was everyone else within three hundred feet," Luke said, then stopped. "Look, I came up here to talk with you."

"I'm not working. You said I could have the night off, so I took it off."

"I'm not asking you to work. I'm asking you to shut up for a minute and talk to me."

"Fine, shutting up." Jess still hadn't looked up from his book, and he turned a page a second later.

"Jess, please. This is serious. We need to talk."

Jess heaved a heavy sigh and put a bookmark in. He turned onto his side and looked at his uncle, affecting wide-eyed attention. 

"Don't give me that look," Luke said. "I'm really serious."

"Okay, Uncle Luke," Jess said. "Shoot. Let's rap."

"Can you lose the attitude for just one second?" Luke sat on the bed. "I got a phone call just about a half-hour ago. It was your mom. She says she's coming for a visit." Jess made no noise as he sat up, then climbed off the bed and grabbed his coat. "Jess? Where are you going?"

"The bookstore."

"You don't have any money."

"I'll browse."

"Well…okay." Luke watched as Jess walked out of the apartment, slamming doors behind him. He followed his nephew down the stairs, and was in time to watch him shove past Taylor as he went out the door.

"Really," Taylor huffed. "That was extremely rude of him. He didn't even mumble, which he's always doing."

"Leave the kid alone, Taylor," Lorelai spoke up, surprising Luke.

Taylor merely took his seat. Caesar waited on him. "So, I take it he didn't take the news well?" Lorelai asked.

"He didn't even react to it." Luke automatically poured coffee for Lorelai, which pointed out to her how distracted he was. "He just got up and headed for the bookstore."

"Huh," Lorelai said.

"He can move really quietly when he wants to."

"I bet." The two stayed where they were, listening to the chatter around them, feeling no need to join in, comfortable in their silence.

**********

Star's Hollow. If Jess didn't know better, he'd say he was starting to like the place. If that was true, the feeling wasn't returned. It was an okay place, he figured. He'd lived in New York his whole life until Star's Hollow, and the two places were even more different than night and day. The whole community was one big neighborhood, with the meddling level that went with it. Jess wasn't comfortable with people knowing what he was doing and who he was with all the time. But he was getting used to it.

He walked through the heart of it, past the gazebo, heading towards his thinking spot. He still always smiled when he remembered the shock of hitting the water, the outright indignation that his uncle would do that. It took a while before he could laugh about it, before the bitterness wore off. It had been humiliating, but he could laugh at it now. What choice did he have? After a while, Jess had realized it was Luke's way of caring. Yes, it was strange, but that was the way Luke operated. The message of the dunking had been, "I'm not putting up with this shit."

As he sat on the wood of the bridge, he acknowledged that he wasn't thinking about what he should be. His mother. Here. He knew that she'd grown up here. But he couldn't reconcile the young person who'd lived here with the harried woman who was barely more than a blur out the door to him. There was no stress to be had here. Or there hadn't been, until he'd moved here. He smiled.

*Avoiding the issue again,* his inner demon chided him. *Think about the real thing. You could go back to New York. You could see your friends again. You could skip school without being caught.* So why didn't the mere thought of it send him into paroxysms of joy? It couldn't be because he hadn't talked with his friends in months. That sometimes happened even when he was in New York. It wasn't because he missed New York itself. He'd seen the reality under the gloss of tourism: the poor, destitute, the wretched scraping for a way to survive. And the people who just maintained, hoping for something better, someday. Like his mother.

"Spend half your life trying to make a change and the other half trying to get back again," Jess said aloud, quoting a song. That was what his mother was like. She'd wanted to escape the small town for the city, but realized it wasn't like on TV. And she didn't know if she could admit she was wrong and come back.

Despite the appearances otherwise, Jess didn't hate his mother. He loved her in the automatic way a child loved a parent. But she hadn't meant to be a mother. He'd known that for years now. She _wasn't _meant to be a mother. When she tried hard, good parenting skills came to her. But it wasn't natural or easy as it was with some mothers. He understood her. After a fashion.

"Hey," Rory said, and Jess felt his nerves jump, but the rest of him stayed still. He'd been too lost in concentration to hear her approaching.

"Hey," he replied. "What happened to Bag Boy?"

"He had to go hang out with his sister," Rory said, sounding just a touch exasperated. "She doesn't like me, so she can't tag along when he and I do something. I saw you heading out here. Is something wrong?"

"Nah," Jess said nonchalantly. But Rory could tell there was something wrong.

"Jess," she said warningly.

"Can't pull the wool over your eyes, huh?" he asked resignedly. He leaned back on his elbows, then looked at her. He tried to ignore the way the sunlight brought out bright highlights in her hair, and the way she looked at him with concern in her eyes. "My mom's coming tomorrow." He saw those big blue eyes get even bigger in surprise.

"Really? She's not going to take you back to New York, is she?" Rory sounded almost afraid that would happen, and Jess ordered his head to ignore the warm feeling he got that she wanted him to stay.

"One never knows with my mother," Jess said.

"So, what are you going to do?"

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know. Are you going to go back if she asks? Are you going to pretend like it's not working out here? Are you going to be mean to her? Are you going to act like you don't give a damn when you obviously do?" She sounded frustrated as she spat out the last sentence.

"I don't know," Jess murmured. "Would it matter to anyone if I did go back to New York? Taylor would be relieved. So would your mother."

"My mom…she's slowly changing her mind about you. It helps that everything you've done since that first night has amused her. She thought the headless snowman was cool." Rory smiled, then looked away. "And I wouldn't want you to go. Who would I argue books with if you left?"

"What about that French girl?"

Rory laughed. "You mean Paris? She's from Chilton. I think we're something vaguely resembling friends, but it's not like I can call her at nine o'clock to rant about a character doing something stupid, or go over to the diner and yell at her for making me read painful Hemingway books…." 

"Hey, there is still such a thing as free will. I merely ask you to give the books a chance. You don't have to do it." But Jess smiled. He was happy that he served a purpose in her life.

"The point is you're my friend. I wouldn't want my friends to just up and leave." Rory looked at her watch. "I've got to go do my homework. I hate coming to the end of school, because teachers think they've got to pile on the homework before it's too late."

Jess smiled. "That's why you only do enough homework to pass."

"Then it's a good thing you're not the one who's driving herself crazy trying to get into school." Rory stood and said goodbye. "I'll see you tomorrow. I'd like to meet your mom." Then she turned on her heel and walked away.

Jess sighed and watched the ripples on the water bounce sunlight into his eyes.

**********

Liz stepped off the bus the next afternoon and looked around. Luke caught the expression on her face and thought it was almost…wistful. But that couldn't be right. His sister was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, with a battered waist-length coat on over it. Her overall appearance was tired.

He moved forward, and hugged her awkwardly. Physical affection in their family had come in pats on the back, not hugs. But they were trying to change that. "Hey," he said.

"Hey," she replied back. Luke looked into her face and saw their mother: their eyes were the same, as was the shape of the face in general. Both she and Luke had their father's striking blue eyes, though. 

"Come on, I'll get you something to eat. Or drink." He began to lead her towards the diner.

"Thanks. I haven't been back since you've opened."

They went in the diner, which was pretty empty. He led her to the counter. "What can I get you? On the house."

"I'll have some coffee, if you don't mind."

"Oh, not another one," Luke muttered under his breath.

"What?"

"Nothing. Uh, Jess should be here any minute. What are you going to say?"

Liz stiffened at her son's name. "I don't know." She looked over her shoulder. "You told him I was coming?"

"Yeah, I did." He started to ask if she was going to take him back to New York, but stopped himself at the last minute.

"Huh," Liz observed. "This place is really great." She sipped her coffee and jolted. "Wow, this is strong."

"Yeah, I guess it is," Luke said, relieved that he didn't have another die-hard coffee addict on his hands.

Just then Jess opened the door to the diner. Liz turned on her stool and looked at her son, a worried look on her face. "Hi, Jess," she said hesitantly.

He nodded at her. "Hi, mom. How's work?"

She sighed. Strict politeness had always been the form for their conversations. "Long. But I think I have a shot at getting promoted."

"That's great," Jess said. He stood three feet away, awkwardly shifting his feet.

"How's school?"

Jess made a small, disgusted noise. "The English classes here are a disgrace. I read most of the books in third grade that they're assigning to juniors and seniors."

Liz smiled. She had no idea where Jess' love of books had come from, but it was obviously something that worked for him. It was the one thing she'd always been able to give him: money to pay for used books and to pay his library fines. She couldn't give him scintillating conversation about those books, but she could make sure he had them.

"Why don't you show her the apartment, Jess?" Luke asked, hinting strongly with his tone.

"Subtle," Jess muttered under his breath. "Okay. Come on," he added. Liz nodded and followed him up the stairs.

"You're living in dad's old office?" Liz demanded when he opened the door.

"Half. See, Luke bought the building next door and turned it into apartments. He doesn't know what he's going to do with them yet, but he's got them. And he remodeled ours." He gave her the grand tour, which took all of two seconds. "So, mom," he said. "What brings you back?"

"You," she said. "I've been busy lately and hadn't called. I never know what to say." She looked down at her hands. "I hardly ever know what to say to you. I never…thought I'd be a mother. I never really thought I'd be responsible for anyone but me."

"I know, mom," Jess said quietly. He gestured for her to sit on the couch. He sat next to her. "I guess I always knew that you were sort of at a loss with what to do with me."

"Oh, Jess," she said. "It's not that I don't love you. You know I do. I do the best I can but…it's not what you need. Needed, I guess. So, I sent you away."

"No, you sent me towards something else. There is a distinction." Jess said it soothingly, hoping to comfort his mother.

"I still feel like I failed you in some way," she said. "I am just not a good mother. I can't be what you need me to be. And I threw you away. I sent you to a place you'd never been before, to live with a relative you didn't know, and ripped you from the place that was your home. I'm sorry."

"Mom," Jess said, his tone turning scolding. "I know. I understand. But you helped me. I…never thought I'd be saying this, and if you tell anyone I said it I'll never let you forget it, but…I like it here. At least enough to know that I never really felt right in New York. Not that here fits any better, but…I fit more here than New York." He frowned. "I still haven't found my place. And if you want to be honest, neither have you."

"When did you get to be so smart?" Liz asked. 

"I don't know."

"So, is there anything in particular you like about this place? I can understand the attraction: it's peaceful, especially after New York." She looked wistful for a moment, and Jess fought the urge to tell her to move away from New York.

"Some of the people are okay," he said, thinking immediately of Rory. "There are some real nut jobs here, but you probably know them better than me. I don't know," Jess sighed. "I just…feel like I contribute something to this town sometimes, you know? Even if it is color commentary."

"Or headaches," Rory's teasing voice came from the doorway. She stepped inside, still in her school uniform. She smiled at Liz and said, "Hi."

Liz raised her eyebrows and glanced at her son. "Hello," she said finally, directing her attention back to Rory.

"Mom, this is my friend Rory Gilmore. She's my book conversationalist." He said the last pointedly, so his mother wouldn't act unusually motherly and ask embarrassing questions about their "relationship."

"Well," Liz said. "I've got to say it's a relief. The last few times I've tried to ask him what book he's reading, everything he says has just gone straight over my head. I'm glad he finally found someone intelligent to talk books with."

Rory smiled more brightly now. "Thank you," she said. "Uh, Jess, I just came to return your—blech—Hemingway." At Liz's quizzical expression she said, "Jess has tried to make me like his writing, and I just don't. But he doesn't like Ayn Rand, so we're even."

"Ah," Liz said blandly.

Rory dug the book out of her bag and handed it to Jess. "Well, it was nice to meet you, Ms. Mariano."

Liz nodded. "The same to you," she said sincerely. She watched as Rory left the apartment, and had just opened her mouth to comment when Jess interrupted.

"She's got a boyfriend." 

Liz's mouth snapped shut, and she frowned. "I'm sorry," she said. "You two would be good together, I think."

"Mom," Jess said. "She's my friend."

"You want more." Jess blushed, answering her question without words. "It will work out," she said reassuringly.

"Was there a darling of Star's Hollow when you were here?" Jess asked his mother. She considers.

"Not that I can think of. Just some of the really popular girls at school."

"Well, Rory is the darling. Everyone knows her, everyone loves her, and everyone protects her. Even Uncle Luke, and especially her mother, who doesn't like me. How can things work out?"

Liz sighed, and recognized the rigidity in her son's voice. "Fine. I guess you'd know more about it than me." Jess nodded unhappily. They sat in silence for a while, lost in thought. "Well, I guess I better get back to New York."

"Move, mom," Jess blurted.

"What?"

"Mom, you hate New York. You don't like your job. Why don't you move?"

"Where would I move?" she asked, scoffing, but not denying what he said.

"Someplace smaller. Someplace where you can get a good job and a nicer apartment."

"I'm not coming back to Star's Hollow," she said, stiffening. "I grew up here, but I don't belong here any more than I do in New York." Jess nodded in understanding.

"I know. But…just find someplace where you do belong."

"I ask again," she said after a small, considering silence. "When did you get to be so smart? When did you learn to read people so well?"

Jess shook his head. "Just promise me you'll think about it."

"I will promise that." She stood, and then pulled him into a hug when he stood, too. "I guess we weren't really meant to be mother and son," she said. "But I think we make pretty good friends. What do you think?"

"You've always been my friend." Jess smirked. "My overworked, underpaid, hassled, older woman-friend, but still my friend." Liz laughed ruefully at the description of her.

On the walk back to the bus stop, Liz craned her neck to look at the new growth of quickly approaching summer. She looked almost wistful, but sighed as she saw the bus coming. "Well, back to the rat race," she said. She hugged Jess once more, then climbed onto the diesel contraption. She waved to her son out the window, and he waved back.

"Not going back to New York?" Luke asked a moment later, once the bus was out of sight.

"Nah," Jess said. He was silent for a minute, looking around the town. "I've still got a few pranks to pull before I quit this town." He smirked at his uncle's heartfelt groan.

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A/N2: Continuing the new "grand" tradition, I'm giving fanfic points to who can tell me the song name and/or name the artist that Jess quotes. Five points each. (Don't ask me what the points are for, 'cause I don't know…but I'll think of something!) I think this one should work, since it's less general. Thanks all, for reading the whole thing. Please review!


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